What Madison Square Gardens Inc. is doing to punish thousands of attorneys is just the tip of the iceberg of where the use of facial recognition technology could take us, and it’s nowhere pretty. Imagine a situation where the owner of a sports franchise decides to ban the family members and staffers of a political candidate they oppose. Or, taken a step further, maybe that same NBA owner decides they’re not going to let anyone in who is a card-carrying member of a particular political party. People showing up to games with tickets, but they’re blacklisted just because they don’t agree with the same cultural issues as the team’s front office. WTF?
Madison Square Gardens is currently punitively banning anyone that works at any law firm that has been or is currently engaged in any litigation against MSG. The Executive Chairman and CEO, Billionaire James Dolan, has a reputation as a publicly combative personality. He is also the owner of the New York Knicks and has a long track record of incurring personal grudges with fans and even former players. He famously banned former Knick Charles Oakley from the famous arena. In this situation, his arbitrary ban has MSG officials scanning the websites of dozens of law firms for the photos of lawyers and other employees, feeding them into their recognition software and consequently banning thousands of these individuals from attendance.
This is the type of case that will in all likelihood make its way up the legal food chain, possibly even to the Supreme Court. It is one of those classic cases of technology vs. citizens’ rights. The possibilities for abuse of facial recognition technology are immense and frightening. It’s not inherently evil by any means. There are plenty of situations that seem like reasonable applications. For example, preventing known violent offenders and individuals with connections to terrorist organizations is a smart use of the technology. But it is a slippery slope and we should all be vigilant as its application unfolds.